About the MBL

The Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) is dedicated to scientific discovery – exploring fundamental biology, understanding biodiversity and the environment, and informing the human condition through research and education. Founded in Woods Hole, Massachusetts in 1888, the MBL is a private, nonprofit institution and an affiliate of the University of Chicago.

The MBL’s oldest and most singular strength is our convening power, attracting the world’s leading scientists and students to Woods Hole. Once largely a feature of summers at the MBL, this convening power is now evident year-round, with research programs, courses and conferences in all seasons. Well over 500 scientists and faculty are involved annually in our research and educational programs – some based at MBL full-time in our research division, some coming to the MBL for portions of the year, and some leading or lecturing in our broad range of research courses.

With a steady flow of students, scientists, and faculty participating in research projects throughout the year, enrolling in one of our research-based courses or thematic workshops, or spending an entire semester here, the special convening power of MBL is making our campus an increasingly vibrant and dynamic location year-round.

MBL Scientists and Staff
The MBL has approximately 250 year-round employees, about half of which are scientists and scientific staff. These are joined each year by more than 500 scientists, summer staff, and research associates from hundreds of institutions around the world, as well as a large number of faculty and students participating in MBL courses (see below).

Award-Winning ScienceAmong the scientists with a significant affiliation with the MBL (scientists, course faculty and students) are 56 Nobel Prize winners (since 1929); 124 Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigators, early career scientists, international researchers, and professors (since 1960); 263 Members of the National Academy of Sciences (since 1960); and 219 Members of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (since 1960).

Affiliation with the University of Chicago
The MBL and the University of Chicago formed an affiliation on July 1, 2013, that enhances both institutions’ missions of leadership and innovation in scientific research and education. The affiliation builds on shared values and historical ties between Chicago and the MBL, which was led by University of Chicago faculty members for the first four decades of its existence. The MBL is an independent 501(c)3 in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. More information on the affiliation and the MBL-UChicago relationship can be found here.

Major Research AreasResearch at the MBL – carried out by full-time MBL faculty as well as hundreds of the world’s leading scientists who are attracted by the MBL’s unique resources and strengths each year – focuses on a number of distinctive themes, including:

new discoveries emerging from the study of novel marine organisms, encompassing research in regenerative biology, neuroscience, sensory physiology, and comparative evolution and genomics;

the study of microbiomes and microbial diversity and ecology in a variety of ocean and terrestrial habitats;

cutting-edge imaging and computation, making the unseen visible to illuminate cellular function and to explore biological mechanisms; and

organismal adaptation and resilience in the face of global climate change and rapidly changing ecosystems.

Educational ProgramsThe MBL offers a range of courses, workshops, conferences, and internships throughout the year. Central to the MBL’s identity are its more than 20 advanced, discovery-based education programs and courses. The focus of these world-famous graduate-level courses ranges from physiology and embryology to neurobiology and microbiology and to imaging and computation integrated with biological research.

Each year, MBL courses attract nearly 550 of the best students in the world, from (in 2016) 333 institutions and 58 countries. Course directors and faculty are leaders in their fields, drawn from leading universities and research institutions around the world. The courses also benefit from partnerships with many commercial developers and vendors, who share the very latest technology in advanced imaging and other scientific equipment each year.

In addition, the MBL hosts dozens of workshops and conferences—accommodating more than 2,600 participants from around the world, as well as courses for undergraduate and graduate students from the University of Chicago and other colleges and universities. Like the more advanced courses, undergraduate programs and research internships at the MBL emphasize immersive, discovery-based learning.

Resources
The Marine Resources Center is an advanced facility for maintaining, culturing, and providing aquatic and marine organisms essential to biological, biomedical, and ecological research.

The Library in the MBL’s iconic Lillie Building is run jointly with the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and houses one of the world’s foremost print and electronic literature collections in the biological, biomedical, ecological, and oceanographic sciences.

The Library’s Rare Books Collection comprises approximately 5300 volumes of scientific books from the 16th through 20th century, including an extensive collection of oceanic voyages and expeditions, a first edition of Newton’s Opticks (1704), and an early encyclopedia of animals from 1560. The collections are available to scholars onsite and significant portions are available to researchers around the world through two digital initiatives – the Biodiversity Heritage Library (biodiversitylibrary.org) and the History of MBL repository (history.archives.mbl.edu/home).

The MBL Archives contains, in addition to institutional records, a collection of scientific papers, an extensive photographic collection dating back to the founding of the institution, and other unique items including two Nobel Prizes and a complete collection of Rudolf Leuckart’s Teaching Wall Charts.